CROSS [ I ] EYED
Iron Maiden's Cross-Eyed Mary cover - I grew up with these guys,
but if you prefer the Jethro Tull orignal . . .
This is the second LA Times collaboration between Sara & Doug; Moe had the other one two years ago. Mr. Peterson is a regular, and I found this link to a crossword blog from Sara - I like the phrase she used to 'celebrate' her first published NYT puzzle. We have a "sort-of" visual theme to the puzzle, as the sans serif font of the LA Times crossword makes a capital "I" look like a vertical line; when rotated, or "rolled", it becomes a hyphen. Took me a bit to suss, but once "EYE" did, "EYE" smiled - a fresh, thought[ I ]provoking theme -AND - there are NO other wandering "I"s in the entire frame. Well done, constructors~! A standard grid, a handful of names, no circles, a balance of twenty 3LWs, and, having added in the "I"s, the 'straight definition' themers become unique;
17. *Inlay material, often: MOTHER [ I ] OF [ I ] PEARL - mother-of-pearl
28. *Not cooped up: FREE [ I ] RANGE - free-range
49. *Flexible: OPEN [ I ] ENDED - open-ended
61. *Lightheaded ones?: JACK [ I ] O' [ I ] LANTERNS - jack-o'-lanterns
37. Silent display of skepticism, or a phonetic hint for making sense of the answers to the starred clues: EYE ROLL - that is, one takes the "I"s in the themers and "rolls" them 90° ( either clockwise or counterclockwise, it works the same 🙄), and now they make sense~!
But Wate, There's More ~!
ACROSS:
1. After-dinner drink: DECAF - Oh, coffee; "EYE" went straight to alcohol 😜 A rolled-eye [ I ] Easter Egg in the clue, too~!
6. Players who may have to start over many times: NOOBS - short for 'Newbies', one who is unfamiliar with whatever they're involved in; here's my Revit T-shirt ( it's a drafting inside joke )
BIM = Building Information Modeling - essentially 3D CAD
11. Cannabis compound: THC - TetraHydroCannabinol - what gives the "buzz/high" of smokin' the (Cross-eyed) mary jane, weed, ganja, pot, herb, grass, dank, chronic, etc.
14. Tickle: AMUSE - some of the slang for marijuana does tickle me
15. Home of the first jet bridge: O'HARE - EYE love clues/answers where EYE learn something new
16. Peach or plum: HUE - it was fruitless trying to fit FRUIT 🙄
20. Opposite of very: A TAD - Atwurd
21. "iZombie" setting: SEATTLE - no clue, but perps gave me all but the two "E"s
22. Lip __: BALM
25. "The Phoenician Scheme" director Anderson: WES - name #1; more from IMDb
27. Surgical tool: LASER
32. Boris Johnson, for one: TORY - no ( British ) politics at the Corner~! Name(ish)
33. Keeps (off): FENDS
34. Treats embossed with flowers, dots, and dashes: OREOs - well, it's not just one OREO today
36. Blue: SAD - another color con clue
40. Cash back?: COW - "Cash Cow"
Dunk your Oreos in your cash cow "output" 🙄
43. Leavening agent: YEAST
46. Typical choice: GO-TO - e.g., when EYE get Chinese, my "go-to" choice is General Tso's Chicken
52. Totally believed: ATE UP - believe it - EYE "ate up" my egg roll, too 🙄 ( and a Thusday dupe )
54. Rx writer: DOC
55. Price points: TAGS
56. Moseys: STROLLS
59. "Poppycock!": "TOSH~!"
66. Short-horned bighorn: EWE - Another rolled-eye [ I ] Easter Egg in the clue, plus a change-up from the "ewe"sual 🙄
67. Key in: ENTER
68. Acrobat's platform: ADOBE - oh so very clever; not a performing acrobat - Adobe Acrobat - the PDF managing software; EYE was stumped for a while
69. "¿Qué __?": Spanish greeting: "TAL~?" - Español, which filled via perps, but still doesn't look right; the literal translation is "¿~What [is] such~?"
70. Run-down: SEEDY - rolled-eye [ I ] Easter Egg in the clue
71. Rub it in: GLOAT - EYE did not have to reach out to the other Corner bloggers for help with an explanation of the theme; EYE figured it out all by mEYEself~! 😁 🙄
DOWN:
1. Reservoir creator: DAM - a dam good way to start the Down clues 🙄
2. Punk subculture: EMO - three-letter "music" genre~? = EMO
3. Share of the profit: CUT - members of Ocean's Eleven got an even cut of . . .
"My advice to you is this [ I ] run and hide"
4. Fearing disgrace: ASHAMED - slighly meh; feeling seems to work better
5. Stanza units: FEET - LINES and IAMBS were just inches too long . . . 🙄
6. "Ask someone else": "NO IDEA." - what do you call a blind Bambi~? no "EYE" deer 🙄
7. Exultant cry: "O-HO~!"
8. Bumblers: OAFS
9. "The Marvels" star Larson: BRIE - the EYE in her name was my one error; EYE had BREE, ergo, did not get my "ta-DA~!". It took a while to find my mistake; once I grasped the theme and changed the vowel - "O-HO~!" name #3
10. Floral leaf: SEPAL - had this one two weeks ago
11. "For real?": "THAT SO~?"
12. Starter, e.g.: HURLER - baseball reference; one of the team's pitchers
13. Sticks in the refrigerator: CELERY - Ah. Not BUTTER
18. Cutesy growl: "RAWR~!" - this is becoming acceptable, I guess
19. Divisions d'une nation: ETATS - Franwche for states ( of the nation )
22. Pair sharing halves of a heart charm, informally: BFFs - Best Friends Forever
23. Environs: AREA
24. Furnish temporarily: LEND - I had LOAN, which is {teeth-suck} close, but 50% wrong
Close, but, definitely wrong
26. Expressed contempt: SNORTED
29. "10-4": "I SEE." - eh, a bit meh, but a rolled eye [ I ] in the clue again
30. Miracle-__: GRO - another rolled-eye [ I ] Easter Egg clue; EYE ordered new house plants through Amazon; they sat on my cold February porch for a few hours - but it looks like they'll be OK . . .
31. Serpentine creature: EEL - ASP would work, too
35. Ye __ Shoppe: OLDE
38. NBA legend Ming: YAO - name #4, crossword staple
39. Predict-ability?: ESP - Har-har; ExtraSensory Perception - another rolled-eye [ I ] in the clue
40. Musical conclusion: CODA - and Led Zeppelin's "last" studio album
41. Earth's pull, for short: ONE G - one (unit) of gravity
42. Settles down, in a way: WEDS - I used to blog WEDs
43. "Just checking in": "YOU OK~?"
45. Discreetly, in slang: ON THE DL - the "Down Low" - not a unique fill
46. Chemistry lab fixture: GAS JET - "HAL" doesn't like this; EYE kept getting GAS KET suggestions
"I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do jet"
"I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do jet"
47. National Gallery of Canada locale: OTTAWA - nailed it, but six-letters Canada~?
48. Old Toyota subcompact: TERCEL - had it, took it out; crossing 'go-to' eluded me at first
My buddy Mark in Florida called his the "turbo Tercel"
50. Public figure?: NOTARY - that person at the bank, e.g., that can attest to your signature
51. Symbol: ICON - Dah~! Not RUNE
53. Works at, as a trade: PLIES
57. Solitary: LONE
58. Venue: SITE
60. __ beetle: STAG - EYE am not posting a picture of this insect 😝
62. Took charge: LED - Zeppelin - no, wait . . . we had that already 🙄
63. Joey of fiction: ROO - Winnie the Pooh, and Kanga's "Roo"
64. "Space Jam" org.: NBA - Not a basketball fan, but I did know this
65. Fully taken care of: SET - win the lotto, and you're "SET" for life~!
Splynter
Spent a few minutes looking for my error
Grid Flow a very low 17.4
32 comments:
The constructors
may think their puzzle was clever, but I don’t. I think it was strained and artificial. And I missed “Brie” and “cow” (the latter’s clue which I would nominate for the worst one of the month) which means a FIW for the third day in a row. Will this misery ever end?
Sub-g sorry you did not like this puzzle but enjoyed immensely. I also think this was an ideal creation for Splynter to explain, great job Richard. We have a second Doug P. offering this time a collaboration with a relative noob who is in the creative business.
It took me much longer to finally accept the Is which had to be correct based on the perps. BRIE LARSON has been in the news a lot lately and I would think appreciating her legs would mandate know her name.
Lots of music which also is perfect for Splynter. ROSE MCIVER the actress from New Zealand who starred in iZombie a cute bizarre show before became one of the leads in the US version of GHOSTS. A quick question for all, do you stir your coffee clockwise or counterclockwise?
Happy Friday and March is almost here. Have fun all.
Good morning!
D-o noticed the stray i's in the themers, but didn't try to roll 'em. Maybe I should'a read the full reveal clue. Interesting theme concept, but a little to cerebral for me. It took an alphabet run to get that W in COW. The division where I worked was a CASH COW for the mother corporation. Until it wasn't. Hand up for BUTTER before CELERY stalked in. Thanx for the amusement, Sara and Doug, and for the eye-filling expo, Splynter.
Lemonade, black -- no stirring required.
Basically, I don’t follow
“popular entertainment” at all.
In fact, I barely watch television, except to see the local news for the weather report first thing in the morning.
If that puts me at a disadvantage in doing “current” crossword puzzles, so be it!
Amen
FIR, but miami->OHARE (miami has too hot and too rainy, OHARE has too hot, too cold, too rainy and too snowy I FOR THE WIN!) Also pie->HUE, rowr->RAWR, and sneered->SNORTED.
Large businesses evaluate their lines of business in two dimensions - market size and market growth. There are GO-TO strategies for each of the four possible results:
- High Market Share, High Growth - Stars. Aggressively maintain competitive advantage.
- Low Market Share, High Growth - Question marks. Invest to increase competitiveness. If it works, these become stars. If not, they eventually become dogs.
- High Market Share, Low Growth – Cash COWS. Provides cash to develop Question Marks.
- Low Market Share, Low Growth – DOGS. If profitable or part of larger strategic plan, keep. Otherwise, consider divesting or closing.
My inability to spel came in handy today, not knowing that the woman’s name isn’t usually speld the same as BRIE cheese.
Like D-O, I like my (yesterday’s) JAVA just as it comes out of the Keurig.
Thanks to Sara and Doug for the challenging Friday grid. My favorite was “Acrobat’s platform” for ADOBE. And thanks to Splynter for the fun review, especially no eye deer. My kind of awful humor.
Thank you, Sara, Doug and Splynter
D'oh!
I got the solve easily enough, but did not understand that the stray Is were supposed to be rolled to become a hyphen. Not that I didn't try. I just didn't see that. Splynter, thanks for figuring that out for me.
It would have been really neat - for online solvers - if upon correctly completing the grid, that those letter Is would have momentarily emboldened and rotated to make the hyphen, and then rotated back. I know the HTML can be coded to do it, but it is beyond me.
Of course, the down answers wouldn't make sense when they appeared as hyphens. Pen and paper solvers wouldn't see it.
In Spanish I in high school, we learned "como esta usted?" (formal) and "que tal?" (informal) for How are you? "Que pasa?" for what's happening. Thank you Miss Morris.
Splynter, yes that looks like an organic fertlizer. Probably fish emulsion and chicken manure, which is common. After that, you can get get 10-10-10 fertilzer. That's normally your best bet for new yard plantings and for reestablishing plants that you've divided or relocated. Get them in the ground in early spring.
My big SPR project is to dig up, divide and relocate 11 large hostas from the front of the house (where they are getting too much direct sun and reflected heat) to the back and side of the house. At the same time, I'll be digging, dividing and transplanting about the same number of tall sedum to where the hostas were. They love sunlight and also do well in poor soil (but not wet) conditions. Like hostas, tall sedum is extremely low maintenance, but more "showy" than hostas.
My back is already hurting as I think about the amount of work involved.
FIR, but a giant ugh for this puzzle. There were so many things not to like. Several proper names that were somewhat obscure. And when I took chemistry we called that a bunsen burner. I've never heard it referred to as a gas jet.
And the theme (eye roll here) was quite contrived. In fact I had to come here to have it fully explained.
Overall not an enjoyable puzzle.
This puzzle---->Eye roll.
Awful.
Methinks you connect the hose from the Bunsen burner to the gas jet.
This wasn’t my week for enjoyable solving experiences. I never understood the theme in its entirety until reading Splynter’s most astute explanation and even then, I’m not impressed. Adding/subtracting letters themes hold no appeal for me, even ones such as this, which has an added element with Eye Roll. The least unkind opinion I can offer is the juice wasn’t worth the squeeze.
Thanks, Sara and Doug, and thanks, Splynter, for the honest and clarifying review and commentary. Every Friday, you prove how talented you are in not only deconstructing the offering, but doing so in a fearless and candid manner. Thank you.
Last night, I watched the final episode of The Americans, a show that ran for 6 years back in 2013-2018. If you have Hulu, I highly recommend it, especially if the Cold War years and the Soviet-US machinations are of interest. Just be prepared for incessant ads, unless you have an ad-free subscription.
Have a great day.
Ooh! Way over my head. I would never have figured out the theme without Splynter’s excellent explanation. In addition DNF. The SE did me in. For one thing I had DUNG beetle. For settles I had BEDS, so the COW never showed up.
In the North I so confidently filled AHA for MY exultant cry. What else? O HARE, SEATTLE and OTTAWA were lucky WAGS. RAWR baffled me, but it fit.
I’m a fan of WES Anderson, but I don’t recommend “The Phoenician Scheme”.
Thank you Splynter for a particularly good review.
A second DNF in a row. I caught the extra Is and I-Is but never understood the EYE ROLL until Splynter explained it. I don't think I've seen a previous LAT puzzle like this one.
The SW was unfinished. I had no idea what the "Spanish greeting" was. Que TAL. I've never been on a Zoom meeting, but DW has and for "just checking in" I had filled YOU ON and I've heard others say when asking if another person has logged on. I wanted GAS TAP instead of JET, HAL doesn't like it an neither do I. It's just a bunsen burner using a gas supply. JACK never had a chance. with __ACN-I-O-I-LANTERN on the grid. I left it blank.
I know what a Cash COW is but it was quite a stretch to use "Cash back?" as a clue. I only filled it because WEDS filled 42D.
I will second SubG's nomination for the COW clue.
"iZombie" was unheard of but if you've been to SEATTLE, it's a pretty good title. SanFran was a possibility.
L - Counterclockwise (on rare occasion that I add heavy cream😋)
I feel your pain!
Thanks for explaining the eye-rolls❣️ I got the fill, but not the gimmick. I do find the gimmick very clever. Kinda amazing to me that the eye-s are the only i-s in the puzzle! Puzzle constructors never cease to AMAZE 😲 me!! And - I missed cow/weds: started alphabet-run and stopped at “Beds” without checking that “coB” in no way worked🤦🏼♀️ Thanks to all for a fun time❣️
Took 8:50 today, as a matterIofIfact.
Clever theme, but didn't feel the juice was worth the squeeze today. I knew the Actress of the Day (Brie), but struggled with the Spanish saying. I agree about "Cash back" as WCOTM candidate. Sure, "cow" can be added to the "back" of cash, but that doesn't make it a good clue.
[Insert weekly lament for missing Friday's of old.]
Oh - and - I think of “que tal?” as bein’ the “wha’ s’up?!” of Spanish … Si, o, No? - my Spanish-speaking friends?
My least favorite puzzle of the week, and possibly of the month. The gimmick was beyond lame, and too many clues produced literal eye-rolls.
I fall for the AHA>OHO trap 100% of the time, as I have never once, in my 70 years, heard anyone exclaim the latter, or heard the term "that was an oho moment."
I still don't get the cash back/cash cow connection.
Counterclockwise, because I stir right-handed. Clockwise would cause me to back-hand it.
DNF again for me. CASH COW/WED and JACK?O?LANTERN just would not come into focus for me until Splynter ''splained things. The theme made absolutely no sense, and as long as I have been doing crosswords, I've never seen an answer square filled with a punctuation mark. Not an enjoyable effort at all, at all!
I also worked for a corporation's cash COW. Our prosperous setting was the main impetus for the Knights' acceptance of a merger with the Ridders.
I appreciated the stiff challenge presented to us today by Sara and Doug. Affording the solver some "aha" moments is (or ought to be) the constructor's job, and Doug and Sara did so today with the eye (I) rolling theme. Every one of the I's in the puzzle was transformed into a hyphen.
I agree with TTP that it would be really cool and entertaining if through some kind of online HTML magic, all those I's could be made bold and rotated to the horizontal so they're hyphens.
Sara and Doug's craftsmanship is evident in the eye-rolling theme. The letter "I" is an extremely common letter, but Sara and Doug saw to it that "I" never appears in this puzzle except as part of their gimmick. Impressive.
Hey gang, as an English teacher (retired), I would like to remind you of the to/too/two mis-usage. "To" is a preposition indicating direction or movement. "Too" is an adverb meaning overly or also or very. "Two" is a number. Here's a sentence containing all three: I'm taking two gifts to him, too.
The only reason I bring up this reminder is because occasionally I see "to/too/two" mistakes made by--gasp--Cornerites. Next on my docket will be the "its/it's" conundrum.
Thanks, Doug and Sara, for a clever and well-constructed Friday-appropriate challenge. And thanks, Splynter, for organ-tuning--oops, fine-tuning--any and all necessary explanations.
I didn’t admire the theme gimmick, but the puzzle seemed Friday-worthy and contained few annoyances.
Getting started was difficult. RAWR (I’m learning) was my first fill, and Que TAL came quickly if you speak much Spanish. OTTAWA, EWE, and TERCEL filled much of the SW, but GAS JET was elusive, which meant JACK-O-LANTERN was elusive as well.
Elsewhere, I was wary of misdirection. I didn’t fill in THC immediately, fearing it could be one of those other compounds I can’t keep straight, until I finally made sense of the paraphrase THAT SO. HURLER didn’t dawn on me quickly, and neither did CELERY. I hesitated to fill in SEPAL until I was sure it wasn’t petal. Elsewhere in the north, DECAF didn’t occur to me for quite a while, but O’HARE came quickly and NOOBS soon followed.
The SE was difficult. I didn’t think TOSH should be in the puzzle, but it came to light once I changed beetles from dung to STAG. The ADOBE misdirection fooled me way too long. I had trouble parsing ON THE DL, probably because I can’t see a reason not to say “down-low” instead of an abbreviation that is no more terse.
Actual annoyances, other than TOSH, were the unhelpful clue for the paraphrase “YOU OK, the obscure SEATTLE clue, my failure to see 10-4 as an affirmation instead of a sign-off, and the labored clue for BFFS, which didn’t apply to most male BFFS.
It’s rare to see OAF pluralized. Maybe I was holding out for “oaves.”
Musings
-What a great puzzle! I tried and failed on sussing the gimmick but Splynter educated me!
-OHO, is what I said when NOOB (not NAIF), BRIE, SEPAL (not Petal) and OHARE fell into place.
-In January an executive order by Governor PIllen cracked down on synthetic THC products being sold in Nebraska
-My doctor friend let me LASE a piece of chicken. When he moved the vacuum the smell was horrible. He was wrong when he told me that lasers would soon replace scalpels.
-Some churches in our town use day care centers for a CASH COW
-My MacBook key uses the word Return instead of Enter. You have to be a little older to remember the literal use of the word Return.
-Twelve American astronauts have frolicked in the 1/6th G of the Moon.
-My favorite science lab peninsulas had 14 GAS JETS manned by 28 teenagers.
-I always enjoy seeing Lemonade back in our comment queue! BTW, like D-O my black coffee requires no stirring.
FIR …luckily! Until I got here I didn’t understand the eye rolls either. I’m not familiar with tosh or why a cash cow is cash back? And I am familiar with Que pasa but not tal. Happy to get it right, but …weird!
SS, I join you in that weekly lament. 😢
Well, this was painful... I have (blind deer) why this gave me such a hard time...
However, the theme was helpful. Thank you for "splainin." Now that I can see the "I" roll physically, I must admit, this was a great theme idea!
Oh,
And what do you call a "dead" blind deer?
( still, no idea...)
I’m not sure an “eye roll” would cause the “I”s to turn sideways… seems like a stretch.
Perhaps if the constructors had clued it as giving the “side eye” … just IMHO
Best part of today was Splynters recap. I enjoy his informative and honest reviews.
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